🇺🇸💸 White House pleads with defense giants to boost Ukraine aid bypassing Congress

Palantir Technologies, Anduril Industries, Fortem, Skydio and other US defense firms held a meeting with White House officials on Monday to seek how to aid Ukraine amid the ongoing row in Congress.

Led by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, the Biden administration has engaged with top defense contractors to focus on deploying advanced technologies for Ukraine's conflict needs, such as de-mining technologies and UAV systems.

At the same time, Republicans want to link Ukraine aid to funding to stop illegal immigration, also impacting military aid to Israel, Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific. The Biden administration, stressing the $44.3 billion in military aid already sunk into Ukraine, wants another $61 billion as the conflcit enters its third year.

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Hezbollah confirms that another senior commander has been assassinated in Israeli air strike

Ali Hussein Barji, the commander of Hezbollah’s aerial forces in southern Lebanon, was reportedly killed in his car while on his way to attend the funeral of another Hezbollah commander, Wissam al-Tawil, who died as a result of an Israeli air strike yesterday.

Barji’s assassination comes amid a wave of escalation in violence between Israel and Hezbollah, renewing concerns of a regional war breaking out in the Middle East.

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Why Team Biden did not 'miss' Pentagon chief Austin

"I actually think the State Department's more heavily involved in military actions than they should be," Earl Rasmussen, a retired Lieutenant Colonel with over 20 years in the US Army and international consultant, told Sputnik when asked as to why Lloyd Austin's hospitalization had gone nearly unnoticed by Team Biden.

Austin underwent an initial medical procedure on December 22; on January 1, the defense secretary suffered severe pain and was admitted to intensive care at Walter Reed military hospital in Maryland. The White House had been in the dark about his whereabouts for days.

"We've got a lack of process and a lack of communications, and those things need to be seriously looked at especially in our current environment with tensions with Russia and Ukraine,” warned Rasmussen. “We've got tensions in the Middle East that could explode, and easily could bring in Hezbollah and Iran."

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🇮🇱🇵🇸 Latest updates on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict:

▪️The war in Gaza has killed 1% of the Gaza population, equivalent to 3 million Americans, Palestinian Ambassador to the UN Riyad Mansour said.

▪️The Israel Defense Force (IDF) said it had expanded ground operations in the Gaza Strip's southern city of Khan Yunis, claiming to have killed 40 Hamas fighters and found various weapons during a raid on the armed group's military facility.

▪️The number of Israeli soldiers killed since the start of the ground operation against Palestinian movement Hamas in the Gaza Strip has risen to 180, Israeli broadcaster i24 reported, citing the IDF.

▪️Ceasefire is the only solution to prevent the Gaza war from a spillover effect into the region, the Chinese Deputy Ambassador to the UN Geng Shuang said.

▪️Only 15 hospitals are now operational in the Gaza Strip, while cases of infectious diseases are on the rise, including diarrhea incidence climbing to 81,000, Richard Peeperkorn, WHO representative for the Occupied Palestinian Territory, said.

▪️The lead EU spokesman for foreign affairs said that Brussels supported the International Court of Justice, a top UN court tasked with determining whether Israel's war on Gaza was genocidal.

▪️US Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Israeli President Isaac Herzog and stressed the need to minimize harm to the civilian population in the Gaza Strip amid Israel's military operations, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said.

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🇺🇸🚀🌑 The first US commercial robotic unmanned mission to send science payloads to the Moon has failed as the spacecraft is running out of fuel after post-launch problems and cannot make a soft landing on the lunar surface as planned, the Astrobotic Company announced in a statement.

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US Defense Secretary Lloyd Asutin underwent a minimally invasive surgical procedure last month to treat prostate cancer, and his prognosis is excellent, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center officials said in a statement released by the Pentagon on Tuesday.

"As part of Secretary Austin’s routinely recommended health screening, he has undergone regular prostate specific antigen (PSA) surveillance. Changes in his laboratory evaluation in early December 2023 identified prostate cancer which required treatment," the statement said. "His prostate cancer was detected early, and his prognosis is excellent."

According to Walter Reed officials, Austin's hospitalization in early January occurred due to complications following his surgery in late December to treat his cancer. His infection has cleared and he continues to make progress toward a full recovery, but the process may be slow, officials added.

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De-Coupled, De-Dollarized & Developing: De-Centralizing as Well?

The unexpected economic boom witnessed in Russia amid unprecedented global sanctions is evidence to the country’s industrial might.

It is worth noting that all these new manufacturing plants are state-of-the-art, with the latest equipment and systems geared to resolving any shortages due to imposed trade restrictions, Paul Goncharoff, a US native economics expert with deep-rooted ties to the Russian business market, wrote in a Sputnik article.

Military advancements, pharmaceutical breakthroughs, trade cooperation, and enhanced internal logistics contribute to improving the quality of life and income levels of the Russian population.

👉 Read more

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Russian air defense systems shot down a Ukrainian drone and a Uragan MLRS missile over the Belgorod region, the Russian Defense Ministry reported on Tuesday.

"On January 9 at about 19:30 Moscow time [16:30 GMT], an attempt by the Kiev regime to carry out a terrorist attack using an Uragan multiple launch rocket system and an aircraft-type UAV against objects on the territory of the Russian Federation was prevented," the statement said.

The ministry added that one missile and a drone were destroyed by the air defense systems on duty over the Belgorod region.

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🇩🇪 Arming Ukraine is more important to Berlin than supporting German farmers

"The German government is short of money," Gunnar Beck, a member of the European Parliament for the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, told Sputnik, commenting on Berlin's decision to cut subsidies for German farmers.

Nonetheless, the German federal government has just this month managed to provide the Kiev regime with a Skynex air defense system, 10 Schützenpanzer Marder infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs), ammunition for Leopard tanks and other equipment.

"It obviously means that to the German government supporting Ukraine is more important than the needs of its own population. It's as simple as that," Beck said. "Germany would follow the EU and in particular the US [diktat] almost at any cost."

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❗️ Ecuadorian President Daniel Noboa declared on Tuesday that the country is in a state of internal armed conflict amid the hostage-taking riots in various cities and prisons and designated several organized crime groups as "terrorist organizations."

"I signed a decree declaring an internal armed conflict and identified the following transnational organized criminal groups as terrorist organizations and belligerent non-state actors," Noboa said on X (formerly Twitter), attaching the text of the decree in the post.

More than 20 groups and organizations are listed in the president's decree as "terrorist."

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🇬🇧 The UK navy has sent the HMS Richmond frigate to the Red Sea to contribute to the international mission designed to protect the marine navigation in the region amid a surge in attacks by Yemen's Houthi rebels on cargo ships in the region, UK Secretary of Defense Grant Shapps said on Tuesday.

"HMS Richmond is on its way to the Red Sea to ensure the UK maintains a formidable presence in the face of attacks by the Iranian-backed Houthis. With the US, we'll continue to lead the global response to the crisis and do what is necessary to protect lives and the global economy," Shapps said in a statement on X.

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